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Robin Lehner tried to take a bite out of the San Jose Sharks, but he couldn’t do it all by himself.

The Senators suffered their first regulation loss of the season as Brent Burns beat Lehner for the third period winner to give San Jose a 3-2 victory Saturday at the SAP Center.

If not for a strong performance by Lehner, it could have been worse for the Senators, who were outshot 50-23 by the powerful Sharks. Only Bobby Ryan and Zack Smith beat San Jose goalie Antti Niemi.

Lehner’s 47 saves tied a franchise record a regular season game. It’s the sixth time it has happened; the second time for Lehner. The last time was April 2 in a 3-2 loss in Boston.

"I thought we did a good job overall we just couldn't get the win," said Lehner - who was being pretty diplomatic. "We played good. We were good 5-on-5. We knew they were going to come out hard."

Burns winner came at the end of a Sharks power play at 7:08 of third when he was parked in front to beat Lehner low. The Sharks made it clear they felt they could get to Lehner as long as they kept going to the net.

“If we get pucks to the net we’re going to get garbage off this guy,” San Jose assistant Jim Johnson told the local television broadcast after 40 minutes.

The Senators were bolstered by the return of captain Jason Spezza after he sat out Wednesday’s 4-3 OT loss to Los Angeles with a nagging groin injury. But blueliner Joe Corvo was out after taking a puck in the face during the morning skate.

Rookie sensation Tomas Hertl scored for the Sharks in the first, but left in the second period after a collision with Senators winger Clarke MacArthur. Sharks officials said Hertl was “being evaluated.”

With his club trailing 1-0 in the first and outshot 8-2, Chris Neil sent a wake-up call to the bench by fighting the bigger and heavier Matt Pelech. Neil not only won the fight, he served notice to his teammates to get their act together and his teammates did respond.

But it had not been a good start. Hertl and he didn’t take long to give Lehner a taste of what he could be in for -- firing it home only 55 seconds into the game on the fifth shot on net.

"We stressed they were going to come out hard," said Ryan. "That's just not the start you need in a building like this. You need to weather that storm right out of the gate and we were playing chase hockey.

It was looking pretty bleak until Smith intercepted a clearing attempt by Matt Irwin and fired it past Niemi at 15:21 to tie it 1-1. Then, taking a perfect feed from Spezza on the power play, Ryan fired a bullet by Niemi high on the glove side at 18:31 on the power play to give Ottawa 2-1 lead.

The Senators, who have given up four power play goals in their first four games, continued to struggle with their penalty killing.

"We come out that (second) period with a lead and then we took too many penalties," Ryan said. "You can't win games like that. You are playing chase hockey all night."

After Milan Michalek was sent off for tripping, Sharks forward Patrick Marleau scored his fourth goal of the season. He backhand home a loose puck in front of the net with Lehner sprawled across the crease.

Coach Paul MacLean said the club has to stop taking penalties. The Sharks had five power plays and 18 shots with the man advantage.

"We can't continue to take penalties especially the type of penalties we take," said MacLean. "We just can't do it and have any kind of success."

MacLean said if the Senators don't clean up their act "it may come down to not playing."

Once Marleau got the goal at 16:12, San Jose pushed hard to try and take the lead going into the third, but the Senators were able to withstand the pressure.

The Senators travelled to Anaheim after the game and face the Ducks (8 p.m. EST) in Ryan’s first game back. at the Honda Center since his move to Ottawa.